CA Technologies has announced a competition that aims to encourage U.S. developers to present novel open source software-based platforms designed to enhance the “citizen experience” across federal agencies.

In 2016, Hitachi developed high performance data processing technology using FPGA(3). As this technology however was developed for Hitachi's proprietary database, it could not easily be applied to the Hadoop platform as it employed a different data management method and used customized database management software.

The city government paid for a study to look at the IT problems that the city was having. It was done by Accenture, which is a Microsoft partner, so the FSFE and others expected the worst. It turned out not to be what they expected, he said. The study identified several problems, one of which was about an old version of Windows that was still in use, but the biggest problems were organizational rather than technical.

The final release of the Linux Mint 18 series, Linux Mint 18.3, is due to see its beta release sometime this week. The final release will follow in tow a week or so after the beta. Ever since July, we’ve been tracking the changes that are due for Mint 18.3 "Sylvia", however, the team behind the distribution have announced several last minute changes so it’s worth going over those now.

Samsung is now planning to deliver a full-fledged operating system over Samsung DeX with Linux, instead of Windows. While initially, Samsung’s DeX was supposed to run Windows 10 desktop in a virtual environment, the company is now leaning on Linux to offer a desktop experience.

It has been known for some time that Samsung has been experimenting with the idea of running Linux distributions through its DeX platform on its Galaxy smartphones. The idea, being quite simple, is basically there to allow the user to use their device for multiple purposes, one of these being a replacement for the traditional desktop.

Samsung Electronics is entertaining the idea of bringing the full-fledged Linux operating system to the Samsung DeX platform, and these efforts were highlighted in a recent concept demo video published on YouTube by Samsung Newsroom, showcasing Samsung DeX running the Ubuntu 16 Linux distribution. Assuming that this feature will be implemented, it may place the DeX docking station on the radars of more potential customers as the product could grow in popularity especially amongst Linux users.

The National Security Agency has spent more than a year investigating a series of catastrophic breaches and has yet to determine whether it’s fighting foreign hackers or a mole inside the agency, The New York Times reports. At the center of the saga is a mysterious group called the Shadow Brokers, which has been taunting the agency with periodic dumps of secret code online—leaks that employees say are much more damaging to national security than the information leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Some of the stolen code has been used in global malware attacks such as the WannaCry cyberattack, which crippled hospitals and government institutions across the world. Current and former employees have described a mole hunt inside the agency, with some employees reportedly asked to hand over their passports and undergo questioning. Yet investigators still don’t know who the culprits are, be it an insider who stole an entire thumb drive of sensitive code, or a group of Russian hackers—for some, the prime suspects—who managed to breach NSA defenses. “How much longer are the releases going to come?” one former employee was cited as saying. “The agency doesn’t know how to stop it—or even what ‘it’ is.”

The only thing that would have been nice is that after the project had been finished and the chip deployed, that someone from Intel would have told me, just as a courtesy, that MINIX 3 was now probably the most widely used operating system in the world on x86 computers. That certainly wasn't required in any way, but I think it would have been polite to give me a heads up, that's all.

Microsoft has increased its commitment to open-source technologies recently and has a wide variety of Linux virtual machines (VMs) available for Azure users to deploy. In September, the company revealed that it was working with Canonical for a custom Linux kernel for Ubuntu VMs on Azure.

The tool itself could offer game developers an alternative to tools like CMake and Premake, specifically one that Ubisoft says generates 100 to 200 times faster and works well with both big C++ code bases and multiplatform projects.

We inquired about people’s relationships with their connected devices, like smart TVs, Fitbits, and routers. Questions ranged from “What connected devices do you own?“ to “What is your biggest fear as we move toward a more connected future?”

Nearly 190,000 people around the world responded. People from the tiny islands of Tuvalu to the huge landmass of China and everywhere in between. (Mozilla released the survey in six languages: English, Spanish, German, Italian, French, and Portuguese.)

What we learned is fascinating. Like: People in India are more likely to own a smart appliance, whereas people in Argentina are more likely to own a smart TV. And: People everywhere are worried that a more connected future will jeopardize their privacy.

Mozilla is partnering with museums, universities, nonprofits, libraries, and high schools in Texas, Louisiana, Kansas, and beyond.

“We’re focusing on projects that leverage gigabit internet speeds — up to 250x average speeds — to make a positive impact in the communities we serve and across the country,” says Lindsey Frost, who directs Mozilla’s gigabit work. “Projects use augmented reality to train first responders; raise awareness about coastal erosion through virtual reality simulations; bring robotics into high school classrooms; and much more.”

Through the Mozilla Gigabit Community Fund — a partnership with the National Science Foundation and U.S. Ignite — Mozilla invests in projects that leverage lightning-fast gigabit internet connectivity to further education and workforce development.

If you haven't upgraded your pfSense BSD-based firewall to the major 2.4.x stable series yet, we have some good news for you today as the pfSense 2.3.5 security update is now available to download.

pfSense 2.3.5 is a maintenance and bugfix release for the pfSense 2.3 stable series of the world's most trusted open source firewall, and it's here to patch a few critical security vulnerabilities, including that nasty WPA2 KRACK (Key Reinstallation Attack) issue.

The FreeBSD Foundation is pleased to announce a collaborative project with Delphix to implement one of the most requested ZFS features, to allow RAID-Z pools to be expanded one disk at a time. We’ve combined our resources with iXsystems and Delphix to bring this project to fruition. The RAID-Z Expansion project will allow OpenZFS users to incrementally add storage to their RAID pools, one device at a time. The expansion will happen online, in the background, with zero downtime, and while maintaining the redundancy and reliability of RAID-Z.

More in Tux Machines

Why open source could be IBM's key to future success in the cloud

Do those same developers need IBM? Developers certainly benefit from IBM's investments in open source, but it's not as clear that those same developers have much to gain from IBM's cloud. Google, for example, has done a stellar job open sourcing code like TensorFlow and Kubernetes that feeds naturally into running related workloads on Google Cloud Platform. Aside from touting its Java bonafides, however, IBM has yet to demonstrate that developers get significant benefits for modern workloads on its cloud.
That's IBM's big challenge: Translating its open source expertise into real, differentiated value for developers on its cloud.

Top 8 Debian-Based Distros

Most people tend to forget that despite Ubuntu's success over the years, it's still just a distro based on another distro - Debian. Debian on its own, however, isn't really well suited for newer users...hence the explosion of distros based on Debian over the recent years. There are lot of great choices for Linux users. Which one is best for you?

Compact, rugged IoT gateway offers dual GbE with PoE

Inforce has launched a $250 “Inforce 6320” IoT gateway that runs Linux on a quad -A53 Snapdragon 410, and offers WiFi, BT, GPS, HDMI, USB, -30 to 85°C support, and dual GbE ports with PoE.
Inforce Computing’s $250 Inforce 6320 is a compact (170 x 95 x 42mm) IoT gateway that runs Ubuntu Core (Snappy) and Debian on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 410E. Inforce promises “periodic upstream kernel based BSP releases [that] include in-depth documentation along with a host of royalty-free software.” The Debian BSP includes LXDE, drivers for all available interfaces, as and access to the Inforce TechWeb tech support services.